Morrisons has cut more than 4,000 jobs across its UK stores over the past year, a move the supermarket described as a 'tough decision' aimed at strengthening its financial position.
Companies House filings show total debt levels grew further despite the reductions. In the year to last October, staffing fell from 101,144 to 96,232, a drop of 4,912 workers. This included more than 4,200 shop-floor positions.
Reasons for the reductions
A Morrisons spokesperson said: “Colleague numbers in the year ending October 2025 primarily reflect the impact of the closure of the newspaper home delivery service in convenience, the restructuring of the retail people team and the downsizing of the Rathbones bakery business.
“There was no additional redundancy programme in stores, where numbers were only reduced by not replacing those who had chosen to leave.”
Financial pressures and market position
The supermarket is undergoing a turnaround programme under boss Rami Baitieh after losing market share to rivals. Discount stores Aldi and Lidl have recently overtaken Morrisons in grocery market share.
The Morrisons group, owned by US private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, reported net debt increased to £7.52 billion for the year, from £7.07 billion the previous year. Net debt excluding lease liabilities and preference shares stood at £3.2 billion. The company also reported a £629 million annual pre-tax loss before exceptional items.
Resilience despite challenges
Underlying earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation remained at £835 million for the year despite cost increases.
The spokesperson added: “In our 2025 full year we grew like-for-like sales every quarter, maintained Ebitda and our market share, and demonstrated our resilience in the face of some tough external headwinds, from the cyber incident, rising inflation and government cost increases, which we worked hard to offset.”
